After the launch of our completely re-imagined iOS apps for iPhone and iPad in February, we now are offering a universal Android app to succeed the Samsung-only version we’ve had in the Google Play store.

And we have been working on new responsive designs for our article pages that will ensure an optimal experience on any Web browser and any device. The new designs offer a bold new look with enhanced visual appeal and more features for sharing, navigating and experiencing all that MarketWatch has to offer.

We’re offering you a sneak peek in order to get your feedback and reactions before we roll out these new article concepts.

The images below will give you a good sense of the user experience on mobile, tablet and desktop, and I look forward to hearing your thoughts on these designs. Please share your reactions as comments.

Mobile Phones

Standard article Featured article

Stock quotes Navigation

Sharing tools Comments

Latest News Search

Tablets

Standard article in portrait mode

Featured article in portrait mode

Standard article in landscape mode

Featured article in landscape mode

Laptop/Desktop

Standard article

Featured article

]]>http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2014/04/23/heres-a-sneak-peek-at-marketwatchs-new-mobile-optimized-article-pages-what-do-you-think/feed/0Tax Day special – Cast your vote on the best way to fix the U.S. tax codehttp://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2014/04/15/tax-day-special-brettarends-asks-you-to-tweet-me-a-better-tax-code-and-heres-what-you-suggested/?mod=WSJBlog
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2014/04/15/tax-day-special-brettarends-asks-you-to-tweet-me-a-better-tax-code-and-heres-what-you-suggested/#commentsTue, 15 Apr 2014 14:14:18 +0000Glenn Hallhttp://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/?p=48MarketWatch columnist Brett Arends thinks the U.S. tax code is broken and he wants you to help fix it.

So we’ve turned to Twitter to let you have your say – just send your suggestions to @BrettArends and include #MWTaxes. We’ll see if @BarackObama, @SpeakerBoehner or any other elected officials take notice.

I’ve gathered up the most frequent suggestions into this poll – please cast your vote for the best idea:

Here’s a glimpse at the conversation on Twitter so far:

]]>http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2014/04/15/tax-day-special-brettarends-asks-you-to-tweet-me-a-better-tax-code-and-heres-what-you-suggested/feed/0Bitcoin experts to evaluate future of cryptocurrency at MarketWatch special event March 4http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2014/02/25/bitcoin-experts-to-evaluate-future-of-cryptocurrency-at-marketwatch-special-event-march-4/?mod=WSJBlog
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2014/02/25/bitcoin-experts-to-evaluate-future-of-cryptocurrency-at-marketwatch-special-event-march-4/#commentsTue, 25 Feb 2014 13:37:21 +0000Glenn Hallhttp://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/?p=39The sudden overnight disappearance of the Mt. Gox bitcoin exchange, where the virtual currency collapsed to below $200 this week from a high above $1,200 just a few months ago, shows the risk behind the opportunity for investors.

As a reader of this blog, you are automatically invited. So if you will be in New York on Tuesday, please consider joining us for an evening of cocktails and conversation on the topic.

MarketWatch Senior Columnist Robert Powell will moderate a panel discussion with Todd Harrison, founder and CEO of Minyanville Media; Mark T. Williams, a banking and risk management expert and a professor at the Boston University School of Management; and Barry Silbert, founder and CEO of SecondMarket and founder of Bitcoin Investment Trust.

The discussion, part of the MarketWatch Investing Insights series of special events, is called ”Bitcoin: Boom and Bust.”

Admission is free, but space is limited, so please reserve your seat right away. For more information or to RSVP, email MarketWatchevent@wsj.com by Friday, Feb. 28.

No need to enter your investments manually — just add your accounts and your securities will be imported safely and securely so you can monitor your investments and keep track of relevant market-moving news and actionable ideas from the MarketWatch team. Your accounts will be synced daily to keep everything up to date, and all of your data is locked in a secure environment and will never be shared or made public.

Most major U.S. brokerage firms are supported, so you can see all of your accounts in one place, allowing you to compare performance across portfolios and group all of your holdings by asset class so you can see the big picture.

I should mention that for added security, we’ve added a challenge question when you log in to your portfolio. If you haven’t already set up a security question on MarketWatch or WSJ.com, you will be prompted to select a question and provide the answer. If you have forgotten the answer, contact our customer service department either via the Live Help link at the top of the portfolio page or by sending an email to: productsupport@dowjones.com.

The new portfolio works alongside our Watchlist tool. So if you already set up a Watchlist, you can continue to use the service as a stand-alone feature without syncing your accounts — just hover over the Portfolio link on the right-hand side of the main navigation bar and click on “Watchlist” in the window that opens below. If you don’t want to sync your accounts, you also can manually enter securities and use the portfolio tool as a more advanced watch list.

We’ve added plenty of useful bells and whistles to our new portfolio, including the option to receive mobile-optimized email summaries to track your investment goals. Charts and graphs are automatically generated to help you visualize your investment performance across any date range you prefer. Real-time market updates are on the same page, so you don’t have to leave the portfolio to check quotes.

Best of all, it’s completely free!

And if you happen to be a Wall Street Journal subscriber, you can access the same portfolio on both MarketWatch.com and WSJ.com.

There’s much more to say about the new portfolio tool, but the best way to learn about all the features is to simply set up the account and let the tool guide you through all of the great features. Click here to get started: New portfolio.

Whenever market-moving events happen, wherever they may be, investors need to know right then, right there. We get it. That’s why we completely overhauled the MarketWatch mobile app to combine our award-winning real-time news with our live market data.

The new version of our iPhone and iPad app that arrived in iTunes this week offers an all-new experience based on your feedback and our research into how you use MarketWatch.com. We quietly introduced the new app a few months ago to gather input from early adopters. We’ve made many tweaks in the meantime, and now we’re ready for prime time.

The second you launch the app it downloads the latest news and data and conveniently stores it for offline viewing (just in case you happen to lose your connection). Whenever you are online, the headlines and market data will update in real time.

We also made it easy to share stories or save them to read later. Our customizable stock Watchlists are also mobile optimized and automatically synced with MarketWatch.com, allowing registered users to track stocks on the go.

And when you’re not trading, our app also offers all of our personal finance and retirement planning news and insights as well as our popular general news blogs.

Here is a run down of the key new features from our mobile editor, Jess Marmor Shaw:

Get news faster: The app updates market data and the latest news automatically, at least once every 60 seconds. And, if you need the latest news Right Now, just pull down on Latest Headlines to refresh the News Viewer.

Stay in touch: Market data snapshots and the News Viewer are integrated into every section and page of the app. Go ahead and binge-read some Mark Hulbert columns: While you’re reading, you can still keep an eye on the Dow’s movement and MarketWatch’s latest headlines.

Wherever you go: The MarketWatch app automatically downloads content for you to read when you’re offline — on the train, the subway, an intercontinental flight. Wherever you go, our news will be ready and waiting.

Alerts: MarketWatch’s breaking news bulletins pop up while you’re browsing the app, or alert you in an iOS push notification if you’re somewhere else on your device. Our newsroom works at hyperspeed to publish breaking news bulletins, and on your mobile device, they are faster than ever.

This is just the beginning. We have many exciting developments and improvements just around the corner. And we want to hear from you. Tell us what you think about the new app, and what other mobile features you want from MarketWatch.

BONUS REEL:

One of our clever MarketWatch team members has been testing out some new video tools and created this fun little video to promote the new app:

Did you get in on the Bitcoin frenzy or did you bet on gold? Did you go with U.S. stocks or bonds?

With all the benefits of hindsight, would you like to know how you would have fared with a different asset allocation? Would you like to see how you could have turned $10,000 into $130,709? It looks like this:

MarketWatch

Where you should have invested your money in 2013

As always, I’d like to invit you to try out this new feature and share your thoughts as a comment below.

This is one of our newest interactive features and it’s designed to let you drive the discussion about the top earnings in a real-time conversation with other MarketWatch users and our reporters and editors.

The concept is that MarketWatch editors pick the top earnings each day and put them into columns on the Earnings Wall. We then post previews and expectations ahead of the earnings releases, followed by key details from the earnings release and conference calls – all in real time.

Our users can post their reactions alongside the news on the Wall, ask questions and share insights. Often, users will answer each other’s questions and discuss the earnings. The MarketWatch team will engage alongside you to offer additional information and insight from our reporters, editors and columnists.

We quietly launched the Earnings Wall in October and it instantly became one of the most popular sections on our site during the last round of earnings.

That’s one of our goals at MarketWatch – to deliver the news and ideas our audience wants, when they want it, where they want it and how they want it.

And for millions of people, that means Flipboard.

So as of now, MarketWatch is featured at the top of the Business category on Flipboard. Check us out!

Flipboard is a free app that you can download for for iOS, Android, Windows, Blackberry, Kindle Fire & NOOK. They also launched a web version that can be viewed on any browser.

I’ve included some screen shots below so you can see what the MarketWatch experience is like in Flipboard. On the right, you’ll see MarketWatch is currently the top news service listed in the Business category. Below you’ll get a sample of the MarketWatch experience within Flipboard.

As always, let me know if you have any suggestions or feedback. Just add a comment and I’ll be sure to read it.

]]>http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2013/12/21/youll-flip-when-you-see-this-literally/feed/0Portfolios with Purpose – Putting Wall Street to work for charityhttp://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2013/12/20/portfolios-with-purpose-putting-wall-street-to-work-for-charity/?mod=WSJBlog
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2013/12/20/portfolios-with-purpose-putting-wall-street-to-work-for-charity/#commentsFri, 20 Dec 2013 17:07:04 +0000Glenn Hallhttp://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/?p=21At MarketWatch, we are big fans of investing games as a way to learn the ropes, test out new strategies, exchange ideas and have risk-free fun in the markets. That’s why we have our own Virtual Stock Exchange Games center.

So we were excited to learn about Portfolios with Purpose, a non-profit organization that puts some of those same principles to work on behalf of charities. PwP is the brain child of Stacey Asher, who worked as an investor relations and marketing professional in the hedge fund industry for 6 years before coming up with this concept to tap into Wall Street’s philanthropic side.

At the Portfolios with Purpose launch party.
Photo by Glenn Hall/MarketWatch

Portfolios with Purpose is basically a fantasy stock trading game that brings together many of the major players from Wall Street and newbies alike to compete on behalf of their favorite charity.

“My mission with Portfolios with Purpose is to bring the passion of investing together with the passion of giving,” Asher explained at a kick-off event for the 2014 competition last night on the trading floor at the NYSE.

Rob Sechan, one of PwP’s founding board members and a managing director at UBS Private Wealth Advisors, said he joined the cause because he thinks it’s important to “show the world that investors are really about so much more than investing.” Asher’s idea of highlighting the philanthropic side of Wall Street and raising awareness for charity at the same time is “an easy story to tell,” he said, adding that Asher is “a giver at heart.”

Big investing names are among the PwP players, including Leon Cooperman of Omega Advisors, Jamie Dinan of York Capital, David Einhorn of Greenlight Capital, Karen Finerman of Metropolitan Capital, Joel Greenblatt of Gotham Capital, Steve Kuhn of Pine River Capital and Dan Loeb of Third Point Capital.

For 2013, the professional group winner was Doug Silverman of Senator Investment Group. He played on behalf of The Jericho Project, which is dedicated to helping the homeless get off the street and back on their feet. In 2012, Akiva Katch of Bow Street Capital took the top professional award on behalf of Project Ore, which provides help for isolated and homeless Jews.

Here’s how Portfolios with Purpose works: Every player pays an entry fee to join the game and 100% of those entry fees go to charity (net of credit card processing costs).

Professional investors pay $10,000 to enter the master class competition, the next tier is the professional class with an entry fee of $1,000 and to play in the novice class requires a $100 entry fee. In 2013, there were 11 masters, 46 professionals and 359 novices. For 2013, PwP raised almost $200,000 for charity.

“This is the best thing on Wall Street – marrying investing and philanthropy,” said Gabrielle Guttman, President of Connext Consulting, which is one of PwP’s corporate partners. “I’ve not experienced anything like this before and that’s why I’ve been in from the start.”

To hear about the PwP mission from the founder in her own words, watch the video below from last night’s event:

]]>http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2013/12/20/portfolios-with-purpose-putting-wall-street-to-work-for-charity/feed/0New feature of the week – An interactive tool to help you decide if cutting the TV cord is right for youhttp://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2013/12/11/new-feature-of-the-week-an-interactive-tool-to-help-you-decide-if-cutting-the-tv-cord-is-right-for-you/?mod=WSJBlog
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/2013/12/11/new-feature-of-the-week-an-interactive-tool-to-help-you-decide-if-cutting-the-tv-cord-is-right-for-you/#commentsWed, 11 Dec 2013 14:01:46 +0000Glenn Hallhttp://blogs.marketwatch.com/lookingforward/?p=17We’ve got something special for you on MarketWatch today.

Our reporters and graphics specialists went beyond the norm to create a story package on the popular discussion about whether to “cut the cord” and drop traditional TV services such as cable and get your entertainment, news and sports solely from online providers.

This is a highly personal decision. For some people, it may be a smart way to lower their costs (at MarketWatch, we’re all about helping you make smart decisions with your money). For other people, the desire for live game coverage of their favorite sports is more important to their happiness. And there are many who want to get great movies as soon as possible after they are released.

Recognizing that many factors must be weighed to determine if cutting the cord makes sense for you, the MarketWatch team created an interactive graphic that walks you through the decision-making process and makes a recommendation based on your individual priorities. It will even calculate how much you could save depending on your viewing habits.